The Global Combat Support System - Army Increment I Solution
THE GLOBAL COMBAT SUPPORT SYSTEM -
Army Increment I Solution
Transforming Logistics for America's Army
by L. Edward Tillett
On 4 December 2007, the Army made the Global Combat Support System-Army a practical reality. The first segment of Increment I became operational in the National Training Center’s (NTC) 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment (11th ACR). The GCSS-Army solution replaced all the functionality in the legacy Standard Army Retail Supply System of SARSS-1, SARSS-2AC/B, and SARSS Gateway. The Bravo Direct Support Unit (B DSU) personnel and their higherlevel materiel managers were the first to employ GCSS-Army and now use its functionality for all tiers of SARSS.
This Army-led effort will integrate logistics information and combine various existing independent supply chain systems including supply, maintenance, ammunition, property book, and finance, providing Warfighters with a seamless flow of timely, accurate, accessible, and secure information that gives combat forces a decisive edge.
“GCSS-Army demonstrated that we could replace all levels of the existing warehouse management system [SARSS] and provide equal, if not better, functionality. An important benefit of the system is that movement and management of materiel within the supply unit can be quickly and easily tracked and managed. What we have gained is visibility—at all levels.” CW4 Harold Whittington.
CASCOM ES
GCSS-Army combines Army tactical logistics systems with commercial- off-the-shelf enterprise resource planning (ERP) software. The impetus for this substantial project is the mandate from several government regulatory oversight organizations that the Army should employ commercial ERP software solutions, along with the adoption of service-oriented architectures, to take advantage of lessons learned from commercial best business practices.
The Army has transformed from a division-centric force to a modular brigade-based force. In the new environment, logistics automation and unity is an operational necessity. However, the existing Army Logistics Standard Army Management Information Systems (STAMIS) focus mainly on vertical information flows that exist within standalone, or “stovepipe,” infrastructures (e.g., SARSS, ULLS-AE, SAMS-E). The Army created some of these systems up to three decades ago. In many cases, the technology is older than the operators now using it.
Each of these segments is visible to its process owner but suboptimized— and not centralized—because of stovepipe systems. LTG (P) Ann E. Dunwoody, commander, Army Materiel Command has been a long-time advocate of a single Army logistics enterprise (SALE). The May 2008 issue of Army magazine quoted her as saying, “Our institutional transformation has not kept pace with the operational transformation. Today’s environment requires an integrated approach to sustaining our Army-an enterprise approach to logistics—it’s the way of the future. We can no longer afford to operate a collage of logistics information systems without the benefit of common data or standardized processes. The Army is implementing a commercial-off-the-shelf based, best-in-class resource planning enterprise solution to revolutionize the Army’s national level logistics systems and business.”
GCSS-Army enables the concepts associated with the Modular Army, including distribution-based logistics, two-level maintenance activities (field level and sustainment), ARFORGEN and other dynamic capabilities considered critical to transformation of Army logistics.
Colonel Jeffrey Wilson, project manager, GCSS-Army, explained that when fielded, GCSS-Army will replace the current STAMIS with a common logistics solution driven by a single ‘enterprise-wide’ database. This transformation will allow combatant commanders to anticipate force projection support requirements and identify the location of available assets. “Once implemented, GCSS-Army will enable commanders to know what equipment is ready, what is being transported, and what’s in need of maintenance. For instance, when a battle plan calls for 40 tanks to be deployed in a specific region, commanders could see that only 36 are ready to roll and make situational adjustments as needed. This real-time visibility will aid Army field operations and allow logistics to keep pace with mission goals,” said Wilson.
Soldiers interface with the system intuitively. The screens and functionality are standard SAP graphical user interfaces, similar to the ones used by hundreds of thousands of employees in corporate and government enterprises worldwide.
Assistant project manager for GCSS-Army, Lieutenant Colonel Cary Ferguson, said, “The first segment of GCSS-Army has a modern look taken from commercial environments, which makes it easier for younger soldiers to absorb. As expected, it has taken time and effort to bridge some of the terminology and process differences along the way, but it has been important to put Army logisticians in the same lexicon as commercial logisticians.”
To date, the 11th ACR soldiers using GCSS-Army have given the system a resounding ‘thumbs-up.’ Soldiers appreciate that they no longer need routine activities, such as daily close-outs and backups. Specialist Tara Jaime, stock control clerk, 11th ACR, reported that daily close-out and backup operations previously took nearly two hours to complete. Those same operations are now automated in the background, or eliminated, saving time and enabling her to focus on tasks that are more important. “We can now look into open transactions to respond to requests before there are any issues,” she explained. “GCSS-Army enables us to be more proactive and to research potential discrepancies as needed in order to respond far more quickly than before,” she added.
Soldiers also appreciate having access to improved warehouse management functionality, including bin-to-bin moves, mobile handheld devices, and stock look-up capabilities. The system also proves less difficult to operate than some suggested prior to implementation. Throughout the first six months of the SAP integration, NTC’s B DSU met or exceeded its performance standards, which is noteworthy in view of its status as a two-time recipient of the Chief of Staff, Army, Supply Excellence Award.
With the operational assessment of the first segment of GCSSArmy at the NTC’s B DSU warehouse complete, the Analyze phase for the remainder of Increment I is solidly underway. The prime contractor GCSS-Army team, headquartered near Fort Lee, Va., comprises project management, systems engineering integration, implementation, technical integration, test and evaluation, organizational change management, and deployment.
The project represents the largest SAP integration ever undertaken, which raises important considerations related to connectivity of the Web-based systems, integration, training and, ultimately, deployment. The project’s functional teams are meeting the challenges of the increased scope while, at the same time, adding new personnel and orienting them to the mission. GCSS-Army is a highly configured ERP solution, not custom coded software. This important distinction allows the Army to gain all of the system benefits from the millions of commercial systems worldwide.
The implementation team, where many of the new team members work, conducts rigorous workshops designed to meet requirements of Assistant Secretary of the Army (Financial Management and Comptroller) and Combined Armed Support Command (CASCOM), and to incorporate effective process models for blueprinting the system. Chrishawn Spackman, who leads the integration team, said, “Traditionally, these types of projects are difficult due to the way in which responsibilities are defined. But, we resolved those issues and as a result are now making great progress.” Spackman added, “Jeff Bales, CASCOM government lead, and I are co-leading this effort in order to get the job done. We are blending our efforts at the team level and at the individual levels.”
Successful implementation at NTC in December 2007 of the first segment of Increment I has confirmed many of the early decisions related to the system’s value and architecture. As Dunwoody said, “Having constant and immediate visibility of assets enhances the Army’s ability to fight and win. With continued support for the funding of this whole strategy, Single Army Logistics Enterprise (SALE), we will finally have the corporate database and complete tool set that logisticians have been talking about for years. We must continue to improve our ability to see and know what we have, who has it, and what condition it is in.”
Throughout the operational assessment and continuous evaluation of the first segment of Increment I, soldiers at NTC have reported success adapting to the system. Initially, project manager team members trained users on-site. The users have sustained their learning by cross-training each other, using printed job aids, and querying the GCSS-Army help desk. Staff Sergeant Michael Overton, NCO at the NTC Support Operations Office, says SAP is easy to navigate and that performance is enhanced because multiple open screens allows access to more information from a single point. He added, “We’re also doing work at the brigade level that was once done at the corps level, and we like having more control of what we used to call our manager review file. From a training perspective, most soldiers are comfortable with the system in seven to eight working days.”
A critical component of the GCSS-Army project’s success for the remainder of Increment I and for Armywide fielding is design and delivery of effective instruction and training for users. When fully fielded, hundreds of thousands of soldiers will require a working knowledge of specific SAP transactions and associated processes. To that end, the training team is designing instructional strategies for soldiers who will use the system.
The team will evolve its training from new equipment training (NET) to sustainment training, which means that users will have initial instruction and then will have support materials and guidance available to them for continued assistance after the system is fielded. There are three levels of end-user training. Level one includes instruction on SAP navigation, reporting, and business intelligence; level two is a series of one or more functional overviews; and Level Three is process-based training. Specific segments of the instruction will be developed using the Army’s automated systems approach to training to ensure that it is doctrinally correct, and easily adapted to the multiple locations and delivery vehicles used to reach soldiers.
The deployment and training delivery team is marrying the Army flow model with the evolving training curriculum to ensure that soldiers get the instruction they require. The timing of Armywide fielding combined with delivery of training to soldiers who will use GCSS-Army is a delicate dance. The ARFORGEN structure of the Army controls the strategy for identifying when soldiers and their units will be available for training in their roles, and for integrating the ERP solution. A fielding plan will identify how to mitigate risks through numerous pre-site visits, prerequisite Web-based training for users, on-site stay behind support, and engaging context-sensitive help screens embedded in the software to supplement the instruction that soldiers receive.
“Our most critical logistics tasks are to sustain the combat readiness of our deployed force and to maintain the operational readiness of the current force.” said Dunwoody.
Evaluation of the first segment of Increment I of GCSS-Army continues at NTC’s B DSU. Increment I will move from the plan phase to the analyze and then design/build phases. Using lessons learned from the first segment has provided the project team with confidence for successful implementation into the additional environments of maintenance, property book, ammunition, and finance. Strategies for integration and implementation are under review and, with the added scope, will serve to create a true financial and logistics enterprise solution.
Dunwoody encapsulated the mission of the GCSS-Army program when she said, “Enterprise logistics is fundamentally about seeing the entire organization and the relationships among its people, processes, functions and organizational parts. Today’s environment requires a more holistic approach to sustaining the Army—an enterprise approach to logistics. The Army has become a $230 billion enterprise. For the Army enterprise to be effective, we must synchronize our efforts in order to sustain our campaign-quality Army. It is not a matter of turning the Army into a business, but one of understanding the business of the Army, which will ultimately improve the effectiveness of our ability to sustain the warfighters. Managing such complexity requires leaders who are not just logisticians; they must be “enterprise logisticians.” ♦